


Don't Listen to Demons

by NorroenDyrd



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Developing Friendships, Drinking to Cope, Drunken Confessions, Drunken Flirting, Drunken Kissing, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Friends to Lovers, Girly Girl, POV Blackwall, Post-Champions of the Just, Self-Doubt, Sleepy Cuddles
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-04
Updated: 2018-01-04
Packaged: 2019-02-28 07:53:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,196
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13267017
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NorroenDyrd/pseuds/NorroenDyrd
Summary: Feeling immensely worried for a (future) Inquisitor Cadash, who was greatly upset by the encounter with the demon in Therinfal, Blackwall eventually finds her drowning her sorrows at the Herald’s Rest and comforts her.





	Don't Listen to Demons

Blackwall is haunted by a sort of tugging, almost painful thought that he should not be slumping about idly like this, hovering with no direction like a bloody bumblebee with one wing half pulled-out. He should be sharpening his blade, adjusting the fit of his armour, getting himself in shape by sparring with Cassandra or Cullen, dropping by the barracks to talk to some of those jittery farm kids who still have not properly caught their breath and gathered their wits after the 'Inquisition's first big ass-kicking' at Therinfal Redoubt (as that fuzzy-haired girl, Sera, puts it).   
  
He should be putting himself to use, not wasting time on bumblebee imitations: their new Templar allies will be arriving soon, at which point, all the men and women in Haven capable of wielding a blade or a staff will be taking off and marching to close the Breach.  
  
Should be, should be, should be... Maker's hairy jewels, he knows that! He just can't bring  himself to focus on anything but the look on the Herald's face when she circled around the redoubt's grey, rain-polished courtyard, with her dainty little fur-adorned boots caked with mud, her soft round elbow drawn back to position the arrow on a terse bow string, and when her eyes bored unblinkingly into the writhing, flickering shape of the enraged demon ahead of her, and framed with thick, smudged circles of her habitually heavy make-up, which was, very obviously, not only leaking because of the weather alone.  
  
For the Herald's companions, barely a blink passed between the moment when the Lord Seeker staggered forward, reaching to grab her small, chubby self and pull her up to eye level with surprising ease, looking even more pasty-pale and glassy-eyed than in Val Royeaux, with water droplets snaking down his cuirass and making it seem like his very armour was breaking out into a sickly sweat; and the moment when his metal-clad form slithered downwards, limp and crumpled as the shed skin of a serpent, and gave way to the Envy Demon's real body, enormous and grotesquely deformed, stitched out of chunks of raw pink flesh into... some monstrous grasshopper, for lack of a better comparison. But, judging by what she would later tell them - in curt, sparse sentences that Cassandra had to draw out of her with the persistence of a torturer - the Herald herself had to spend that blink braving a long and dangerous journey through her own mind, pushing back the vile creature that was trying to mimic her likeness, and take over the Inquisition, and march off at the head of an entire army of demons that would leave the whole of Thedas a smouldering ruin.  
  
And something about this journey, this struggle that lasted both a fraction of a second and a whole insufferable eternity, this clash with the darkness invading her thoughts, seems to have... broken her. There was glaringly visible terror and steady, unfading pain in her gaze when she shot arrow after arrow after arrow at the demon, moving without a single pause for breath like she was a wound-up toy.  
  
That same toy image continued to haunt Blackwall when he watched her on the journey back. Her limbs and head seemed to be moving as they were supposed to, feet stepping one in front of the other, arms reaching up as she clambered onto her loyal stout pony, lips shaping one-word replies to Cassandra's questions, neck tilting in a nod when someone called to her... But her mind was clearly wandering elsewhere, and those wanderings did nothing to ease the pain that she was in. That she might still be in.  
  
This is not right. This is not like her usual self at all.  
  
Her usual self is so quick to giggle and smirk and wink and tease some fiercely blushing, wretched sap that somehow cannot look away from her pink, embroidered push-up corset.  
  
Her usual self cuts her advisors' strategy overviews short with some chirpy nonsense or other, demanding to know who they are saving this time and will they pretty please have a lunch break.  
  
Her usual self is carefree and coy and vain, gleefully basking in the fuzzy coils of glittering feathery boas and the smooth folds of iridescent silk and the heady waves of sweet perfume (which she inevitably dumps over her coquettishly curled, potion-bleached hair in entire bloody jugfuls, despite Vivienne's overdramatic exclamations 'Darling, no!').  
  
Blackwall still remembers that, during the first few days of their travels together, being around this little golden girl, spoiled rotten by a 'merchant' father, who had allegedly made his fortune thanks to ties with the Carta, was almost too much for him. She did not turn out the least bit what you'd expect the Herald of Andraste to be - nothing like the noble leader of a just cause, and everything like the bratty pain in the rear that young Rainier had once been. It was not infrequently that he seriously considered turning his back on this Inquisition and its whimsical Herald and vanishing back into the familiar, welcoming wilds, where he could quietly hide from himself, and just as quietly kill his modest share of monsters and save his modest share of innocents. But luckily, he stayed.  
  
Because he had brains enough in his battered old skull to figure out that, despite first impressions, the Herald is nothing like young Rainier. Rainier was an arse - still is, in many ways, no matter how hard he tries to do better. The little Carta princess, though... She may fawn over her own reflection in the mirror, and flirt with any adult possessing the gift of speech, and stomp her foot with childish impatience when things do not work out the way she wants on the count of three - but her heart is in the right place. She always gasps in shock and disappointment when she sees people suffering from cold and hunger, and spends the Inquisition's (and her own family's) gold on refugee shelters with as much readiness as on her own dresses, and drops whatever she might be doing to make friends with a stray animal or a street urchin. She may not be grim and serious like a righteous knight anointed by the Maker - but well, neither is he. Not all the time. Not when he is around little Fuzzhead - or the Herald.  
  
She is the heart and soul of every company, the sort of friend you go to for a fun-filled afternoon off (both in the innocent and not so innocent sense of the word). He has lost count of times when she made him laugh - involuntarily, reluctantly at first, and then, with more and more gratitude warming his chest as he chuckled into his beard. And dammit, he hates seeing that laughter die!  
  
That does it. Blackwall straightens up, flexes his shoulders and back, takes a long breath of the crisp air, so frost that it makes the inside of his nostrils feel sharply bristly for a moment, and strides off along the makeshift path of brownish-grey, muddled snow, which leads from the stables and armoury, where he has claimed a little cot for himself, to the heavy wooden gates of Haven proper. The Herald has to be somewhere out there - and if she does not marvel at the crystalline blueness of the sky the way she usually does, he will darn well make sure she does. He will make sure she gets back to normal.  
  
After asking around a couple of times in the motley crowd of civilians, who are crowding to get their steaming bowls of stew from the communal kitchens, and Chantry sisters, who are fluttering about like spooked red and white butterflies, frantically preparing for the service to bless the Templar newcomers, he finds her at the tavern, slumped all alone in a corner, and so quiet and withdrawn that his heart clenches painfully.  
  
She has already had a few drinks, by the looks of her: there is a pulsing magenta blush pooling all over her cheeks; her once neatly styled hair has matted into a lopsided likeness of a bird's nest, which she keeps kneading absentmindedly with her fingers; her make-up is streaking again; and she does not appear to care in the slightest for the fact that, as she has laid her bosom over the counter, her breasts have spilled out of her loosened corset, almost to the point of baring completely.  
  
That last detail of her heartbreakingly dishevelled appearance makes Blackwall falter on the spot a bit, flustered and somewhat out of breath - before he resolutely yanks free the fastenings on his padded overcoat and, making a point not to act ungentlemanly and keep his intrusive gaze away from the Herald, comes up to her and gently wraps her in a thick, padded cocoon.  
  
'The drink may trick you into thinking you can't feel the cold,' he says softly, pulling up a stool next to her. 'But it's freezing outside'.  
  
'And I will have to clear out of here soon'r or lat'r, right?' she slurs hoarsely, giving him a dark look from under drooping eyelids.  
  
'Well, you do have to close the Breach some time soon,' Blackwall reminds her after tactfully clearing his throat. 'Some rest in your quarters beforehand won't hurt'.  
  
'Yeah, like I can do it,' she blurts out, taking another swig out of her tankard and squishing her soft face in a grimace as the liquor burns her throat.  
  
'I will help you walk back, my lady,' Blackwall offers, while his eyes wander in concern to the tall clay vessel full of dark, tangy-smelling slosh. 'And while you sleep, I can cook up a simple morning-after remedy that...'  
  
'Ugh, I dinn thean mat... Dinn mean that!' she exclaims impatiently, swivelling around to look at him and then gagging a little as her head must have begun to spin.  
  
'I meant the Breach! I can't have what it takes to close it! I... The demon said if it... turned inname... into me... No-one would notice cuz I am a monster already! A shady duster, a smu... smuggler's daughter... Too stupid, too filthy, too... wrong... It said that... As a gen... ral of a demon army... I'd least be worth sum'thin... And I keep... Keep hearing it... In my mind... No matter what I do... To make it stop... How... How do you people handle this... Pictures... voices in your head... Things from the Fade... Telling you how awful you are... Or is it just me?'  
  
'It's not just you,' Blackwall says, carefully wiping the hot, murky, greyish tears off her cheeks. What he says next absorbs him so much that he completely forgets where his hand is, and it is not until it's too late that he realizes that he has been cupping her face this whole time.  
  
'We all have demons haunting our nightmares, hissing to us that we are not worthy. Sometimes... Sometimes they are right. But in your case, the demon was wrong. The very fact that you defeated it should tell you that. You make a perfect Herald. You are strong, and kind, and you care for the little people. And also... You are such a wonderful friend. With a knack for making people happy. There... There is no-one else I would rather follow'.  
  
When he finishes, the Herald grows pensive, her eyes huge and almost clear of the drunken haze when she looks up at him.  
  
'You aren't saying this just to comfort me? To be nice?'  
  
'If I cared so much about being nice, I'd be an Orlesian,' he quips, still unaware that he is cradling her face, too mesmerized by the liquid shimmer in her eyes, and by the way the glow of the tavern's hearth highlights her tangled hair, tracing a blurry golden halo round her head.  
  
She smiles, a languid, drowsy smile, gradually more and more lulled by the combined effect of drink and being swathed into the blanket an oversized coat. Reasoning that it is about time to call it a night, and that they will move quicker if he just carries her in his arms, he finally lifts his hand from the Herald's face (with his heart thudding at the discovery where is has been) and sweeps her up in his arms and starts walking to the door, seen off by a very audible 'Aww' from Flissa.  
  
The Herald does not object, all snug and cozy in Blackwall's embrace - but when he slows down in the doorway, she shifts a bit and plants a swift kiss on his cheek, purring,  
  
'You said it was freezing... So take care... I don't want your cock falling off... I have plans for it...'  
  
Well, um... That was... Ruder than her usual flirtations. But then, she is quite drunk. At least, she seems to have cheered up. And with the hangover cure he mixes for her, she will soon be right as rain, ready to close the Breach like the hero she is, and to prove that demon wrong.  
  
And thank the McFucking Maker that his cheeks and throat are the only places his blood is rushing to right now.


End file.
